Recollections On a New Age Begun
Think of the hope and change of just the last six months that have changed all our lives. It was, I remember, around the beginning of February when the understandable liberal angst about the Bush deficit simply disappeared. Gone. Vanished. No more haranguing about red ink and shorting our grandchildren.
For the last eight years, I had some admiration-albeit along with plenty of bewilderment-at the newly fiscally mature Congressional Democrats and their impassioned attacks on Bush’s fiscal irresponsibility.
But then suddenly their principled opposition paid off. Deficits disappeared-at least the multibillion species. Yes, borrowing was replaced by kinder, gentler multi-trillion dollar “stimuli.” This was our moment, this was our time when a crushing debt of the last eight years was at last alleviated, and with the New Math we can be so stimulated as to grow our way out any shortfall the naysayers claim follows.
The other Bush nightmare immediately went as well-the primitive way of counting joblessness by the percentage of unemployed workers. Gone too was the Neanderthal idea that the silly Congressional Budget Office knows anything about the projected growth in GDP. And who can accurately project the likely size of deficits (and especially the arcane idea that you can’t save money on health care by borrowing another $2 trillion first to get the needed economies in place)?
So who said the government couldn’t run GM, or teach Chrysler a thing or two? All gone, those worries. Now I just read the New York Times columnists or listen to geniuses like Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner, and have discovered just how light, breezy, sunny things are becoming.
At about the same time we all awoke from our eight-year trance, the energy crisis ended. Flat out was gone. Solar, wind, geo, and bio swept the country. The old anxieties-nuclear this, coal that, ‘drill, baby, drill’, shale, tar sands, and that wolf in sheep’s clothing, natural gas-all went back to Texas with Bush’s oil cabal. Now in the age of alternative energy, I know you share my relief that we have both plentiful power and a green planet, once Cheney’s old friends also slid back into the shadows and Palin “got over” her fetishes about ANWR.
I once worried that a Civic was too small, and now see that it is far too big. I just drove over the passes of the California coastal range and for the first time realized that I once used to be bored silly with those bleak untouched “natural” landscapes. Instead, in the ‘age of wind’ now I just absorb the manmade beauty of a far better horizon of hundreds of swishing windmills-2-, 3-, 4 propellered varieties, some white, others grey, with beautiful dirt roads carved out from the once ugly natural hillsides to each one-all unobtrusively churning, churning so that I can have air conditioning this summer without a carbon imprint.
I think it was around early spring when we could relax that Bush’s godawful “war on terror” was won. Finally, the Bush/Cheney hysteria ended, and we got instead the much preferable “overseas contingency operations.” These well-planned humanitarian efforts dispensed with any lingering “man-made catastrophes.” I used to shudder when I heard “Guantanamo” and braced for the “Stalag” and “Gulag” invective that followed. But then mysteriously that went away too in late winter. In place of those icky “enemy unlawful combatants,” there were suddenly misunderstood “detainees,” replete with personal stories about like our own.
Better yet, Guantanamo was almost, nearly, about to be closed as well, at least we knew sometime it would be gone and that was just as good as if it already was. Who knows, I thought at the time, maybe the innocent once released may at last turn up on a beach on some Caribbean island, as we make long overdue amends to these framed “terrorists”?
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114 Comments
1. SportLife » We’ve All Metamorphosized to a Higher Plain:[...] with plenty of bewilderment-at the newly fiscally mature Congressional Democrats and their impas Go to Source Leave a comment Related PostsJune 7, 2009 — Economy has Tiger’s Dubai golf course on [...]
Jun 23, 2009 - 5:20 pm 2. Vinny:With all the good feelings going around, who needs Universal Healthcare?
Jun 23, 2009 - 5:21 pm 3. TLM:VDH:
I still have the impression that a fair number of Americans would read this litany of ludicrous Obama “accomplishments” and miss the sarcasm.
I hope Obama didn’t miss the YouTube video of young Neda’s death in Teheran. Chest-shot through ‘n through (she was specifically targeted it seems), lying in a pool of blood with her lifeless eyes deviating right — toward the camera — as if to say, “Why?”.
Indeed Mr President, why? Why no denunciation of her killers (until now)?
“We have become ever so happy, ever so light as never before.”
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:06 pm 4. SeanLA:“…But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.”
Me? I see my future looking more and more like this:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4743764437450613383
When freedom is outlawed, only outlaws will be free. Hope to see you at the hole in the wall Doc! Like Homer, around the fire, you can inspire us us with tales of great Ulysses, `how his naked ears were tortured’
Actually, that sounds kinda good to me…
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:17 pm 5. smitty:Shoot the hopium,
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:26 pm 6. Dave the Kapampangan:Smoke the changeeba.
The metamorphosis has been in our ability to apprehend reality.
Instead of looking up at the sky and feeling the wind and apprehending weather directly, we get the weather second-hand from the media. And when the media refuses to report the weather, we slip and slide and get into car accidents without understanding why, until such time as the weather is finally reported in the media.
When the fourth estate, academia, and the liberal wing of the Democratic party merged last fall, we lost the newsfeed and got fed less expensive opinion and propaganda instead. And since many news consumers lack the ability to apprehend reality directly, the nation continues to slip and slide towards disaster without their understanding why the world seems to be getting screwed up– instead relying upon a “hope” and a cult-like belief in Obananarama.
As we get bitten more and more savagely by “unseen” forces, we might slowly come to realize that an entire world exists outside the worldview propaganda reported by our entitlement media echo chamber.
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:27 pm 7. Mike McDaniel:Ah yes, as Dr. Pangloss said, we live in the best of all possible worlds. That is, until a variety of unimaginably expensive bills–and not just in financial form–come due. And sadly, it’s not a matter of if, but when.
But on the bright side, we likely won’t have GM, Chrysler, and the New York Times to kick around anymore.
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:36 pm 8. johnb:Yeah,,, right.
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:36 pm 9. Doug Wright:I tried to buy a new shirt, blue like most I’ve bought in recent times. However, the clerk said that the new ones, those with the neat circle patch on the left shoulder, the one with pale red and white stripes and pale blue oval, will be out soon, whenever the clothing allotment is approved by the shirt Czar!
Also, the clerk asked if I wished to put my member number on the order list. When I asked her “What member number,” she sent me away, quickly.
So, all’s well as long as that shirt gets here before winter arrives. Of course, with our mandatory global warming classes this Fall, winter won’t be an issue any more! PBUH who leads us.
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:49 pm 10. Rivka:Of course, not *all* racism has disappeared, because we still had those fat, ugly, evil pundits attacking poor Sonia. They probably conspired to make sure she broke her ankle.
Otherwise, the world is indeed a beautiful place, and I’m almost certain that the sunshine is brighter than it was under the Bush administration.
Jun 23, 2009 - 6:54 pm 11. Charles Gordon:This ironic diatribe demonstrates that it’s not only the nanny-state we have to fear, but also the ninny-state: the absurd assertions that we have to bow to the superior achievements of the Islamic world’s legacy, to intrinsic Latina wisdom, and to the scientific proof of the West’s lifestyle’s control over the forces of nature.
Such nonsense would be whimsically entertaining if we didn’t have to pay for it with our hard-earned dollars or by compromising the future of our children. Sadly, we will.
Jun 23, 2009 - 7:07 pm 12. Ron Kean:Obama learned a lesson in Chicago with William Ayres.
First, get a bunch of money from the government.
Second, give lots to your friends and stiff those who didn’t support you.
Third, get thugs like ACORN to lean on people you don’t like.
And the media is still bowing to him. Surreal.
Jun 23, 2009 - 8:24 pm 13. RitchieV:Brilliant.
Jun 23, 2009 - 8:45 pm 14. StudSupreme:Gee, Dr. Hanson, one might almost detect a note of….sarcasm.
Jun 23, 2009 - 11:28 pm 15. Lawrence Kohn:Don’t you realize the Iranian Mullahs love us now since our Messianic leader essentially ignored the great masses of protesting civilians in his efforts to ingratiate himself with the theocratic regime? They only call us the Great Satan in a normal voice and don’t scream it at the top of their lungs anymore………..
Cordoba-well, there was a golden Muslim age in Spain a few centuries before the Inquisition but it was ended by…Muslim fanatics called the Almohades. Jews, who had flourished under the previous Muslim rule, were forced to convert or fled, like Maimonides, to Muslim North Africa or like others fled north to Christian Spain and flourished there until the Inquisition. A lesson in defining goodness by actions, not automatically by tribe, or religion, or country. But in the new age its who you are not what you do that counts as Professor Hanson has noted many times. Perfect choice in invoking the phrase, “lightness of being”, a reminder of the Unbearable Lightness of Being written by a Czech dissident in the wake of Soviet suppression of Czech society in 68. Though the President was too young to be responsible, had he been President then we know the Czechs would have received the Uribe, Netanyahu, East Euro treatment and the Soviets the Cairo speech or at best the hesitant, nuanced condemnation he is giving Iran’s regime. My father hearing a pundit discourse on a left wing dictator decades ago said that the pundit had “praised the dictator with faint damnation” an apt description I think for Obama regarding Iran today.
Jun 24, 2009 - 5:05 am 16. Bob Newton:Looks like VDH has spent some time in Room 101.
Jun 24, 2009 - 5:35 am 17. Jack:Prof Hanson:
I hate to criticize you, but here goes.
You should probably try to avoid satire/sarcasm in the future.
Jun 24, 2009 - 6:58 am 18. ~Paules:Whenever I contemplate government run windmill farms, my mind’s eye turns to visions of public housing. In about a half generation I’m looking forward to a booming business in scrap metal. I’ll need about fifty acres of desert scrub and an old flatbed truck. Investors anyone?
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:06 am 19. Michael:I appreciate the sarcasm, and Dr. Hanson is a thoughtful man, but this is awful:
“Instead, in the ‘age of wind’ now I just absorb the manmade beauty of a far better horizon of hundreds of swishing windmills-2-, 3-, 4 propellered varieties, some white, others grey, with beautiful dirt roads carved out from the once ugly natural hillsides to each one-all unobtrusively churning, churning so that I can have air conditioning this summer without a carbon imprint.”
Has Dr. Hanson ever considered where most of our energy comes from? Has he ever come to West Virginia? I bet he hasn’t, but if he has, I’m sure Don Blankenship et al kept the view of the mountains nice-n-pretty from the interstate. I would appreciate it if Dr. Hanson (like the other Dr. Hansen, Jim) would stand up for the ‘battered Americans’ here in Appalachia. It’s a shame, sir, that you’ve never been downstream from a coal slurry in Raleigh or Boone County. You would write a lot better — or be a lot funnier, here — if you had.
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:36 am 20. steve macdonald:I chuckled through most of this post until I realized that a huge portion of the public and a significant majority of the MSM see this as reality. We truly live in “interesting” times.
Jun 24, 2009 - 8:25 am 21. PM:Ahhhhh, lets have a group hug!!
Jun 24, 2009 - 8:38 am 22. Robert Winkler Burke:The Trouble with Mind Meddlers
By Robert Winkler Burke
Of inthatdayteachings.com
Copyright 6/18/09
Being as I was born,
In the land of the free,
America, the United States,
In Nineteen Fifty-three.
My early schooling taught me,
To love liberty’s self-constraint,
But now liberty’s under attack,
By meddlers doing what I can’t.
Bigot meddlers of prejudice believe gender,
Race or deference get preference,
Meddling mind rape it is, for Justice must be,
Blind lest law be rot and logic rent.
But my teachers,
God bless ‘em, didn’t do this to me,
They minded my mind,
Not meddling up who I could be,
God help our poor children,
Now taught by meddlers of insanity,
They teach to hate logic,
And liberty lovers like, well, me.
All hail our great Founding Fathers,
The sanest of the sane!
They protect us from meddlers,
Who would enslave each brain.
Hail Washington, Jefferson, Adams,
Jun 24, 2009 - 10:03 am 23. Michael:And noble revolutionary crew!
They fought for reason and liberty,
Hoping, loving, dying; that we would too.
I hate to mention it but I have not seen it elsewhere. Wind turbines take heat out of the air by slowing it (the air) down. At lot of wind turbines will take a lot a heat out of the air. This will affect the environment downstream by creating an “effective” carbon footprint.
Has anyone been able to determine if this will have a noticeable impact?
There here is no free lunch.
Jun 24, 2009 - 10:07 am 24. Robert Winkler Burke:Dear Professor Hanson, Lewis Carroll saw all this coming in 1872, that discountable white male!!! Who but the inestimable Carroll would have thought that thought… would be esteemed only if it wasn’t thought, but was actually JABBERWOCKY!
The man was a genius! But it might take more than a genius to 180 this somewhat antichrist trend…
JABBERWOCKY
Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!”
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought –
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
“And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Jun 24, 2009 - 10:10 am 25. Ron Kean:Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
15 . Lawence Kohn
I agree with your post with the exception of the ‘Jews flourishing in the Golden Age’.
I used to believe that too until I was contradicted by Andrew Bostom from his latest book about historical Islamic anti-semitism.
As it turns out, one of the early Jewish reformers, Abraham Geiger coined the term Golden Age for Jews in Moslem Spain. He was the successor to Moses Mendelssohn. Mendelssohn’s Deist friend and mentor Gotthold Ephraim Lessing wrote a play called ‘Nathan the Wise’ which was the first excercise in moral relativism describing Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as essentially the same.
Bostom says that the Moslems at that time were typically brutal to Jews and the Golden Age was a myth.
The legacy of the early Jewish reformers as well as Christians who were really Deists (Jefferson ‘All men are created equal…’) is today’s secularists who think right-wing Christians and so called Ultra-Orthodox Jews are the biggest threat because of their proximity and radical Islam isn’t because it’s so far away since all three religions are essentially the same.
Jun 24, 2009 - 10:31 am 26. Pajamas Media » We’ve All Metamorphosized to a Higher Plain:[...] Read the entire piece here. [...]
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:23 am 27. Sherab Zangpo:It’s the marxist-islamist paradise.
Allahu akbar !
Thank you for the opportunity to comment.
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:31 am 28. Jshub:After last fall’s election I told a number of downcast friends that “Well, at least from now the news will always be good.” And so it has proven. “Our stern alarms hath changed to merry meetings” and we now all dwell on the Big Rock Candy Montain. The true Leviathan is upon us and he enfolds us all in his wise and powerful embrace.
I just pulled my copy of “The True Believer” out of storage and am once again amazed at the perspicacity of Eric Hoffer. All of those hard-bitten, independent, transfgressive cynics (of the Bush-era) now transformed into a virtual flock that bleats the good news. Believe me Professor Hanson, you aren’t being sarcastic enough.
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:57 am 29. Terry Gain:As the streets of Tehran ran red with the blood of pro-democracy protesters Barack Obama issued his strongest statement yet to the political leadership in Iran:
Supreme Leader and your most excellent holy leaders of Islam in Iran. Please consider using less vigorous debating tactics or I may have to withdraw the invitation to our July 4th party.
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:59 am 30. Self-hating Boomer:Funny the senators from Massatoositts don’t see windmills that way. It’s not for us to try to comprehend gods, I guess.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:02 pm 31. Sebastian Shaw:Hope & change is going to turn into anger & discontent under President Obama; he presents an illusion or mirage as his tries his best to undermine the Constitution & reshape America in his Communist image. It will backfire. The press has already lost its love given his recent press conference: The questions were more pointed & Obama tried his best not to answer the questions. The lovelorn MSM will turn their knives on Obama as the Glenn Close character from Fatal Attraction. How’s the love Barry? And the adoration? The MSM’s love will melt away once Obama does not live up to his expectation of being God…
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:02 pm 32. Normal Person:VDH, Great reading and fun. Keep up the good work.
-President Obama and his followers do live in an alternate (postmodern) un reality. It is if they all have an advanced case of arrested development. They manage to take their misguided ideas on all issues and make them even more stupid (example: affirmative action wasn’t good enough–now beneficiaries of it are more qualified and have richer, more vibrant experiences than the rest of us).
-Stunning how the President dictated to his lemmings not to support the Iranian protestors and they fell in line, lock-step.
-American military casualties aren’t news stories bashing America anymore. Now, they are just ignored.
-VDH is instructing us to start expecting from BHO what we once thought was unbelievable.
P.S. I heard an Iranian lady protester on CNN this morning screaming for USA help (for real)
….President Obama: (deep inhale of a super-light cigarette out-of-sight of his kids), “We’ll get back to you, sweetheart, when we find out who wins this thing.”
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:07 pm 33. MikeHu:#19 “Michael” – Nice supporting evidence for Prof. VDH’s point.
“He does have new clothes… He does have new clothes… He really does!!!”
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:07 pm 34. Moogie:Dr. Hanson, your writing has always had a hint of the sublime. In this delightful satire, you have hit sublime square on the head of the nail.
I would futher add that we no longer need to research or investigate any new, incumbent, or up-coming political leaders, as our competent mainstream media has taken vetting to a whole new level. This relieves the population of much legwork and eye strain. In particular, we can thank the Always Obama Channel – ABC – for taking on the ardent task of relaying and interpreting Obama’s every utterance so that we won’t have to suffer the mental task of trying to understand his agenda on our own. What a carefree, enlightened world we now live in!
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:09 pm 35. antaine:I wonder if the backbone of the upcoming Obamacare pitch will be the man himself performing Messianic Laying-On-Of-Hands™ on every American as a low cost alternative to cancer drugs and expensive surgery.
hmmm…..
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:14 pm 36. "progressive"watch:When Obama became president,he should have read the American people their Miranda Rights instead of taking an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:15 pm 37. chrisa:“Life has become merrier, comrades, life has become better.”
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:24 pm 38. WR Jonas:– Joseph V. Stalin
This past spring I had an opportunity to drive through west Texas and the eastern half of New Mexico. My wife and I crossed the great escarpment called the Caprock a little after sun rise and the sweeping vista which once inspired artists , photographers and settlers has been destroyed by these pathetic whirling monstrosities.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:26 pm 39. Thomas L......:This is not the first time we have seen these turbines but they are a blight which we will be paying for for decades to come .
Machines only have a limited and short life span . When other technologies make these things obsolete the battle will rage about the cost of removing them. The government will not feel obligated to subsidize their destruction.
Then the states will be required to step in and use your tax revenues to decommission them. When the total cost is tallied up against what they produced it will be a wash.
Sigh. I can relax in harmony and peace, happily knowing that 2+2 does = 5.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:36 pm 40. AThinkingPerson:Hats off to Dr. Hanson for bring a bit of levity to what is fast becoming a very depressing state of affairs. If the current administration had been written about in a book even 10 years ago we would have all said that there was NO WAY Americans would let this happen. Guess our God-awful educational system has caught up with us when the illiterate and unthinking finally reached voting age just in time to elect Obama. hooray.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:49 pm 41. A.W. Murphy:Dr. Hanson,
Funniest thing I have read in weeks – excellent.
As almost to validate your piece, today the Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffet was interviewed on CNBC. The piece was brief and the anchor person never asked any difficult questions but Buffet remarked that the economy is in a “shambles” and likely to stay that way for some time. He then went on to observe that “cap and trade” would be a huge, regressive tax.
If memory serves, Mr. Buffet was a major supporter of Obama’s. Nowhere in this interview could he bring himself to directly criticize Obama for his misguided policies. And, people wonder why we’re in such a mess – as your excellent article suggest, the MSM has put on their rose-colored glasses.
The First Amendment guaranteed us a free press – not necessarily a good one.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:56 pm 42. iowavette:The “wind farms” are actually a double whammy. There’s the incredibly intrusive tower and nacelle above the ground; under the ground is the Walgreens-sized block of concrete that is seldom brought up in polite conversation. So, Paules, yes. I’m ready to invest; particularly in light of my impending retirement in the face of Argentinian-esque inflation.
Furthermore, I sure in hell won’t miss the NY Times, but I will miss General Motors. Contemplating the drive home behind 405 booming horses versus the underpowered buzz of a Camry, you pick.
Jun 24, 2009 - 12:56 pm 43. J.E. Dyer:Professor, I think there’s some good news. As we edge ever closer to eco-collectivist nirvana — troubled only by the remaining recalcitrant problems that make continued collectivization necessary — wasteful pastimes like driving into the mountains in oversized Honda Civics will go the way of the dodo.
You won’t have to worry about having to view energy being generated (or coal being mined), because you won’t go anywhere anyway.
In fact, given the way modern medicine, science and research, emergency services, public sanitation and so forth hog energy, there will be far less of any of them, and lifespans will decline to their pre-20th-century levels.
So, congratulations, Professor. In the eco-collectivist utopia, you’ll already be dead.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:02 pm 44. macko:Boobama continued with the same bush policies he condemned. Swore his opponent would be more of the same while boobama was that and much more.
All boobama changed was the subject.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:08 pm 45. always right:Professor Hanson,
Could you not use such words as ‘meta-morph-sumting’?
Us bitter clingers are still trying to figue that out.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:15 pm 46. el hefe:VDH:
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:20 pm 47. Michael:I must have missed it but the 7th trumpet must have already sounded and now we don’t need to count the days any more because the messiah is here and we have been transformed into our new spiritual bodies free from corruption and sin. Hallelujah!
How could we be so blind?
#33, MikeHu, simply doesn’t get it. Yikes.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:22 pm 48. Leatherneck:Lucifer Trust, I mean Lucis Trust inside the UN building has the same agenda. Perhaps, that is why Air Force One is painted UN puke blue.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:36 pm 49. JED:Dear Doctor:
This pass is issued to you in that it is assumed that you were writing the 40th Anniversary Tribute to Woodstock Nation.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:39 pm 50. Kat in Indiana:As Wavy Gravy said from the stage of that cultural earthquake,”Stay away from the brown acid.”
Where are all the hippies now, long time passing?
The only lightness I feel is in the pit of my stomach, after it has reflexively purged itself following the latest from the Ministry of Information. Anyone have some spare Maalox I can use?
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:44 pm 51. Dave:Iran, in a way, gives the sensible among us an opportunity to jump out of the airplane of collective harmony and remember what’s important.
People are dying, by the hundreds, murdered by oppressive Islamist government. Good and evil are clearly contrasted. Iranian government is EVIL, EVIL to its core.
Even those who don’t pay much attention to the news will have their eyes opened by this struggle, and by Obama’s disinterested presumption that he will still be dealing with the mullahs when it’s all over.
Reagan would be outright threatening the mullahs right about now. We know where your palaces are, your meeting rooms, and we have bombs that we can send through the front window at will. The bombing, as he said, will commence in five minutes.
What is interesting to me is that Obama, who presumably is ‘on the side of the Muslim’ as he has said, is willing to play golf while hundreds of good muslims cry out ‘allahu ahkbar’ and drown in their own blood.
He has not moral foundation. He is a sociopath, unmoved by the plight of the suffering. He is a powermonger, an ideologue, a frightening preview of dictatorship to come.
Jun 24, 2009 - 1:58 pm 52. Avitar:I miss the sarcasm. Is it just New York and LA audiences that do not get the jokes? The Chinese certainly got the joke wnen the treasury secretaty told them that they could trust Obama.
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:15 pm 53. MikeHu:46. Michael: #33, MikeHu, simply doesn’t get it. Yikes.
VDH: “Large, omnipresent windmill farms are over-rated environmentally” = “VDH loves unreclaimed open-pit coal mines in Appalachia.” Am I missing something?
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:20 pm 54. Ed Wallis:Ahh…Dr. Hanson, dear, DEAR Dr. Hanson…
I enjoy your writing, though I think your “sarcasm” isn’t as impressive as your other, insightful writing. I mention this only because you reference “The Unbearable Lightness of Being”. Czechs have been masters of such humor (SEE: The Good Soldier Schweik/Svejk, by Hasek).
It doesn’t suit OUR situation IMHO because, while it contains the power of subversive revolt, it also drowns itself in *R*E*S*I*G*N*A*T*I*O*N*…a concept thoroughly “foreign” to Americans (I say this as a 1st generation American).
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:38 pm 55. CurtisLove:My lightness of being started the minute the pigs took over the farmhouse. It’s so wonderful to have other animals like us in charge of the farm, having chased away those nasty white male farmers.
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:39 pm 56. Self-hating Boomer:I just can’t understand why the rules painted on the wall of the barn keep changing….
What coal mines? We don’t have any coal mines. Electricity comes from the grid. You some kind of troublemaker?
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:39 pm 57. Ms. Attitude:Since Obama has been president I have not made my car payment or my house payment because Obama is paying them for them! Life would be good but a tow truck keeps following me and someone keeps putting these notices on my door!! Don’t these people get it, Obama is taking care of me now.
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:55 pm 58. Normal Person:Oops there goes another Republican southern govenor for 2012… via Argentina. So, we come back to California for the next president. An amazing intellect, a farmer and man of the people, an unbeatable debater. VDH in 2012! Seriously, the MAN is on some kind of roll. Making perfect sense with or without sarcasm.
I’ll bet some of you have thought this, too. Or at least wished for some politicians to think like Dr. Hanson.
Jun 24, 2009 - 2:57 pm 59. Michael:@51, MikeHu: I was primarily responding to VDH’s insinuation that liberal critiques have ended post-January 20th, specifically applying it to wind farms/means of energy production. Instead, environmental groups have stepped up criticism and protests, as some of you have probably noticed in the national news as of late.
I don’t mean to rave unnecessarily, and your point is taken — I understand that a criticism of the reality of “clean energy” is not the same as support for MTR or even coal mining to begin with. If not from wind power, where does VDH think most electric power comes from? I just find it a bit un-funny to criticize an unquestionably better form of power just because the hills are a little ripped up. And yes, I appreciate the jokes, and no, I’m not some bleeding heart lib — but I did vote for President Obama in November because of how badly President Bush and the Republicans have ripped up my county. So far, President Obama isn’t doing a whole hell of a lot better.
Still, I’d love to hear what Prof. Hanson has to say about MTR — if he treats it as a simple property rights issue or if he has the brains (and heart) to address it more subtly and holistically.
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:02 pm 60. Big Red:Yep, if you know your mushrooms, Life is good.
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:12 pm 61. HalifaxCB:Excellent pice, Dr. My only fear is someone at ABC News will read it on air with a straight face.
Very amusing. The scary part is that a lot of it sounds like it was lifted straight from Frank Rich (NYT) or EJ Dionne (WaPo).
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:15 pm 62. john from cinncinatti:metastasizing is my choice of words. it brought a fond memory of being curled up on the couch and having Mr. Rogers singing its a beautiful day in the neighborhood, as the,sound of gunshots, sirens wailing and the helicopters flying overhead and the police bullhorns announcing to everyone, to stay inside. a true warm and fuzzy feeling…
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:47 pm 63. Mr Lucky:Dr. Hanson,
Don’t you realize that by exercising your privilege (now a privilege) to free speech in the way that you are, that you are upsetting the Space-Time Governmentuum? Quick, dose Hanson with Obama Sunshine. Warp Factor… um, ahhh, ummm, WOW.
Wave your freak flag high, Doc.
I love it, love it, love it.
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:47 pm 64. Self-hating Boomer:The bad news is, it’s lost thrust in one engine, and the other one’s belching black smoke. Oh, and the pilot? He has a very soothing voice over the PA, but they hired him without making him furnish any evidence that he’s ever seen a cockpit before. And he’s looking for cigarette lighter…
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:51 pm 65. Self-hating Boomer:And his last words were “can I just finish my waffle?”.
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:53 pm 66. Delia:I’m still picking and prying the fairy-dust and unicorn horns out of my butt crack as I type this.
I dunno. I just have that ‘not-so-fresh’ feeling with all of this ‘hopenchange’ regime.
Oh well. Anyone want to pull my finger?
Jun 24, 2009 - 3:55 pm 67. rattanman:Windmills are intermittent – there is no good way to store the power they make. Standby capacity in the way of quick starting but inefficient gas turbines is required to back up the windmills (not very green to have to have such redundant infrastructure). In Texas when the wind does kick up, power prices in parts of the state go negative (that’s right – they pay you to use it) which does not exactly encourage thrifty use of resources.
Jun 24, 2009 - 4:06 pm 68. homero:..yes it is questionalable if the muslims created the concept of zero
..but there is little doubt that they are trying to make everything a big zero !
Jun 24, 2009 - 4:16 pm 69. jw:Hindu mathematicians invented the concept of 0 (zero).
Jun 24, 2009 - 4:49 pm 70. Oscar the Grump:Metamorphosis, how Kafkaesque. Will the results be the same as the original scenario?
Jun 24, 2009 - 5:02 pm 71. Oscar the Grump:jw
Jun 24, 2009 - 5:03 pm 72. MiamaMa:I heard it was the Mayas of Central America.
Very good article, as usual.
As someone mentioned, it may be that some people read it, without noticing the sarcasm.
I have another different feeling sometimes when I read your articles, some of which I have to force myself to finish. They are painfully correct. You really nail it on the head, thus, unfortunately and not your fault, increasing my level of frustration.
Keep up the good work!
Jun 24, 2009 - 5:50 pm 73. Jerry:Rattanman #67 wrote, “Windmills are intermittent – there is no good way to store the power they make.”
Google “Daniel Nocera MIT” – He has developed an artifical photosynthesis that can store both solar and wind energy in the form of water separated into hydrogen and oxygen. More important, it is dirt cheap. Completely dissimilar to the high school chemistry experiment where water was electrolyzed into its components using more power than could be produced through their recombination.
This process is a “game-changer.” Unfortunately, because it is so efficient, it will produce very few jobs compared to the coal mines of Virginia. Let us think about this carefully. Because few jobs will be produced, we may not wish to implement it. We will not need socialism to free us from want, because technology will have freed us. What will the politician do in a world where their decision-making is irrelevant to the progress of man?
Jun 24, 2009 - 6:29 pm 74. 438miler:4 legs good.
Jun 24, 2009 - 6:39 pm 75. scott:2 legs better.
Sebastian Shaw Pollyanna,
Wrong. Think about it. Marxists be marxists and stick together. c
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:18 pm 76. scott:A ‘notthinkingenoughperson’,
It’s not the schools dear heart. It’s us. My parents and all my friend’s parents paid five times the attention to the g-dd-med TV than they did my education and moral development. This was the greatest generation raising their kids in the ’50s. Of course its astronomically worse now. Comprende?
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:28 pm 77. Paul of Alexandria:If anybody has read “Jonathan Livingston Seagull” this reminds me of Fletcher “ascending to a higher plane” – right after running into a cliff. I wonder if The One will be able to resurrect us again afterwards?
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:38 pm 78. ~Paules:@ Leatherneck
I’m curious about your comments regarding the Lucis Trust. I’ve been able to verify that they have an association with the United Nations. I have read some of the books by Alice A. Bailey. The earliest references I can find regarding the “New Age” come directly from her. I am even more curious about the genesis of this organization. If you can offer some insight, links, or documents, I would be grateful.
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:39 pm 79. Self-hating Boomer:I suggest that you go read the MIT blurb (again). It’s not artificial photosynthesis; it’s a pair of catalysts to make electrolysis more efficient. But even if this works, electrolysis on an industrial scale still sucks big ones due to ohmic losses.
Sorry, no magic.
/I guess now I need to go off to reeducation camp for that indiscreet disturbance in the mellow buzz…
Jun 24, 2009 - 7:43 pm 80. scott:JED,
Do you actually believe you made a lucid comment? Could it be you even said something you expected ANYONE on planet earth to understand? Mercy! We have not a chance in hell.
Jun 24, 2009 - 8:44 pm 81. William Mueller:Who promulgated that canard that conservatives have no sense of humor? Why this piece demonstrates that even with tongue firmly in cheek the truism that the more things change the more they remain the same is amply shown for all who read these comments. The readers should at least chuckle if not bring up a non-gaseous rumble from their bellies. The lesson VDH teaches with these words of wit is that even the most skilled orator among us with or without higher education can be seen to have shed his clothes no matter how strenuously the media denies his nudity.
Jun 24, 2009 - 9:41 pm 82. ked5:What is interesting to me is that Obama, who presumably is ‘on the side of the Muslim’ as he has said, is willing to play golf while hundreds of good muslims cry out ‘allahu ahkbar’ and drown in their own blood.
~~~
The “lucky” ones will die in the street when they’re shot. The unlucky ones will cry out to deaf ears as they are hauled off to “secret prisons” to be subjected to the will of the thugocrats, before dying from either a bullet or a sword.
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:30 pm 83. ked5:62. john from cinncinatti:
metastasizing is my choice of words. it brought a fond memory of being curled up on the couch and having Mr. Rogers singing its a beautiful day in the neighborhood,
~~~~
At least Mr. Roger’s would know what to do. He was a SEAL.
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:31 pm 84. Realist:To paraphrase the ‘neolib’ tards “Obama LIED and the Economy DIED”
Jun 24, 2009 - 11:34 pm 85. Sunglasses on a cloudy day:What is most telling about your articles is the lack of any intelligent babble from the trolls. They may come and vie amongst themselves as to who actually holds the title of “Troll Czar”, but, much to their protests of the contrary, you’ve already rendered their perfume useless. Thanks.
Jun 25, 2009 - 12:02 am 86. SimplyAmazed:God, is there really an idiot that believes this stuff or did he write it just to get attention? Could anyone be this childlike and clueless?
Jun 25, 2009 - 1:41 am 87. Barbara:I am just so happy now. Thank you for “splaining” it to me, Professor Hanson. For some reason, I can’t get my husband, a small business owner, to realize how happy he should be now that there is no business to be had.
Jun 25, 2009 - 4:37 am 88. Pond’rings » News & Opinion of Note:[...] David Hansen is in high form on his blog this week. It’s well worth the read. Think of the hope and change of just the last six months that have changed all our lives. It was, I [...]
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:01 am 89. Stef:I can’t believe I have to point this out… For those of you who are critical of the writing, it is a parody of a rather famous piece of literature. With the current regime in place, we may want to revisit that piece of writing.
As one commenter pointed out, 2+2=5 in this reality…
Steve
p.s. If you Google the phrase 2+2=5, you will find out the source of Mr. Hanson’s style.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:31 am 90. Cybergeezer:Obama has played President; CEO; Now Doctor. When he plays Physicist we’ll all be blown up.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:38 am 91. mark_b:Who said VDH supports strip mining? Maybe they should have used the windmill cement (which is made by burning tires, btw) to build a nuclear power plant.
Jun 25, 2009 - 7:29 am 92. mark_b:Completely dissimilar to the high school chemistry experiment where water was electrolyzed into its components using more power than could be produced through their recombination.
=================================
So this process uses less power to split H and O from water that is gained in it’s recombination?
That is a violation of the law of physics.
It may be more efficient than electrolysis, but it is not over unity.
Jun 25, 2009 - 7:35 am 93. Nosinin:#89 Stef thanks for the reference. While I understand and chuckle at Professor Hansons musings, finding the writing superb as usual, your reference adds yet another layer his genius.
I fear the ‘plane’ that we are living on is being permanently grounded. It’s creating quite the sense of vertigo. Hopefully someone will point out the right mushroom, we’ll be needing it.
Jun 25, 2009 - 8:22 am 94. Self-hating Boomer:God, is there really an idiot that believes this stuff is serious, or did he write it just to get attention? Could anyone be this childlike and clueless?
Jun 25, 2009 - 8:40 am 95. Al in St. Lou:What did Tom Delay do again? It kinda ruined the whole column when I hit the name of an innocent man.
Jun 25, 2009 - 9:07 am 96. MikeH:#59 Michael – Thank you for the clarification.
I agree with VDHs concern about wind-generated power, since we seem to be pretty stuck right now on windmill farms to generate that power (and just how much bang do you get for your buck on these?). If you live in southern California just head on out east on I-10 toward Palm Springs and you get a pretty good idea of what it would take to create wind-generated power on a mass scale. It seems OK now, I guess, to many of us southern Californians because all of that is “out there.” Somehow I don’t see David Brower types having fought years for wilderness protection suddenly doing an about-face on allowing mass building of windmill farms all over US open-space, no matter how touchy-feely-good “wind power” might make them feel. As has been seen in Martha’s Vineyard, wind power sounds fine, but “don’t block my property’s viewscape.” Coastal southern Californians have fought tooth and nail against offshore oil development rigs for years, so I don’t expect them to embrace windmill farms offshore of Malibu or wherever (although it would be gloriously ironic if they did). VDH is right about all the access roads. I guess for some, access roads for oilfield development = “bad” while access roads for windmill farms = “good.”
Jun 25, 2009 - 10:06 am 97. Self-hating Boomer:We’ve All Metromorphosized…
OK, that makes more sense.
Jun 25, 2009 - 10:07 am 98. Kim Bruce:I was waiting for the “Sarcasm off”.
Jun 25, 2009 - 11:05 am 99. bill:“I was bothered by a creepy Larry Craig, Mark Foley, Jack Abramoff, Duke Cunningham, and Tom Delay,…”
Oh my – posted too soon did you VDH? Or maybe Ensign and Sanford don’t quite fit the post Bush Administration pattern you suggest? I don’t see much of a pattern at all when it comes to ethics and party/ideological preference.
Jun 25, 2009 - 1:33 pm 100. river:Whenever windmills are mentioned, the melancholic Don Quixote comes to mind – tilting at windmills.
Jun 25, 2009 - 2:02 pm 101. Trouble:The President, with his gaunt stature, will make a fine Quixote. A pity about the ears, though – fitting the headgear might be a problem.
The best part, however, is choosing a Sancho Panza – Barney Frank, perhaps?
Dr. Hanson, you always turn out excellent writing, but seldom do you write material that is spit-on-your-chin funny like this.
This article is a home run.
Jun 25, 2009 - 2:46 pm 102. Anonymous:Cuban Missile Crisis=Korean Missile Crisis…There’s more then a danger when you show the other guy how to use yer rifle…and work your system…
Jun 25, 2009 - 8:49 pm 103. Anonymous:Cuban Missile Crisis=Korean Missile Crisis…There’s a danger when you show the other guy how to use yer rifle…or work yer system…
Jun 25, 2009 - 8:50 pm 104. seansarto:Cuban Missile Crisis=Korean Missle Crisis…It’s trouble brew when you start showin’ the other guy how to use your rifle..an’ work your system…fer the pomp an’ circumstance of it.
Jun 25, 2009 - 8:54 pm 105. Ron Kean:101. Trouble
This is the best blog.
Jun 25, 2009 - 9:52 pm 106. Robohobo:Charles @ 11: “…if we didn’t have to pay for it with our hard-earned dollars or by compromising the future of our children.”
I wish the bill will be in dollars. Most likely it will be in blood.
VDH – The snark-fu was strong within you this day!
I am much better now that the arbusto is gone back to Tejas. And that tingle down my leg is explained. It is due to The Pantywaist pResident’s unbearable lightness NOT the blown out disk in my back.
Jun 25, 2009 - 11:08 pm 107. hangnail:#66 Delia: f-ing beautiful, f-ing beautiful! Well put. Simple and to the point.
Jun 26, 2009 - 9:12 am 108. Gaffe Prices:wow, these shackles aren’t very uncomfortable at all, and when my arms get as well developed and muscular as, uh, what’s her- uh, they need to be, and I subsist on a more austere diet of grains and seeds and fruit that falls to the ground, the better I’ll appreciate our masters and their ‘on the double’think and how hard they worked to make, make me be free.
And saved us from ourselves in the nick-pit of time
/tsar-chasm off.
Now I really know what it means to be a schizoid man.
Jun 26, 2009 - 3:11 pm 109. sallie:well heck, I obviously missed that “higher plane” bull. I agree,.. we are small business owners and I have to inform my husband that we should be happier now with with fewer customers….ha
Quote by Norman thomas…
“The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of ‘liberalism’ they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened”
Jun 26, 2009 - 5:19 pm 110. Gaffe Prices:BTW, those are the *new* therapeutic shackles that I mention above.
/czar-chasm switched back on/off again.
Its hard to buy that we’ll be putting out less carbon in the future once we become a smoking ruin
Jun 26, 2009 - 5:51 pm 111. Paul M Hupf:How fortunate we are to have the new President! When the uprisings began in Iran following the recent “elections”, forthright encouragement on the part of the President was needed, not only from the point of view of Iran but also in the interest of what the United States of America stands for. Instead we heard cautious timidity from him several times. Then when it was obvious that the Ahmadinejad crowd were brutalizing their own people, the President preached. Result: both sides find us feckless.
Jun 26, 2009 - 8:37 pm 112. Jack Marcotte:Essential vdh
I am for humor, laughter is good, we could all use more of it, and humor is even good for an individual’s health.
Except: when it is allowed and brought on to deflect an impact of life circumstances that should be felt in its entire monstrosity.
Our ancestors knew when to fight and why. This impact on their freedoms was felt in the gut and heart so the appropriate actions were taken to create America.
Is the destruction of America funny? “It is no laughing matter” does have a much deeper meaning. It is a call to action and focus on the problem at hand.
Are we to lose what millions of Americans have died for—going out without even a whimper?
Individuals in a cage with deadly snake must be prepared to react appropriately or die. This is even if the snake initially seems benign and asleep, dressed up in doll clothes, with lipstick, even “cute”.
Eventually he has to be fed—he has been designed as a single method killer by nature and evolution. What do you think humanizing him and creating jokes about him will do? Nothing.
Eventually to support Obama’s policy property will have to be taken, initially through higher taxes.
Then even higher taxes will not be enough. The state will have to own the property. We will all be renters, managed by government lackeys who eventually will be so corrupted the state will fall in on itself.
America is already dead but remaining assets will be killed by more parasites than it can support, all the assets have melted away, there was no private property ownership and individual responsibility to maintain or improve the “property”. All gone. Just as if we were never here.
Is this funny? Keep laughing you idiots.
Jun 26, 2009 - 9:06 pm 113. Jack Marcotte:Essential vdh
#23, Michael: Wind turbines would not take heat or energy from the air. They would put sensible heat into the air and warm it up.
The “generator” portion of the wind Turbine is a machine that gives off heat when it works and is doing work. Since it is not a biological system it would also absorb heat from the sun that would not be off set by water vapor and it will thus generate more dumb heat into the air by radiation. Just like a tin roof.
A wind turbine is not 100% efficient, thus the operating heat is due to its inefficiency as a machine.
A wind turbine’s over all efficiency as a system for generating electricity is less than 34%. And of course it is not “free”.
The free market place could not support wind turbine costs but your tax dollars will and be “justified” with the OBAMA buffoon system. This is a new “science”. To replace the old one that is now inoperative.
Also it will be supported by the energy bill Cap and Trade system of the brilliant scientist Algore and the other “Ivy League” affirmative action housing crisis boys who want to create a new market option—energy credits that can be bought and sold with “commissions” no less.
This is even a better scheme to lift money from taxpayers and investors than “churning” stocks. They may be affirmative action but they know how to calculate their commissions. Algore will become more and more like the fat dumb pig he really is.
I was born on a farm in Kansas that had a small wind turbine generator. It got disconnected as soon as we were wired to the grid. It was much less efficient than the 34% efficiency of current technology. My dad got tired of climbing the tower to maintain it also.
Enough wind turbines’ on a TB Pickens wind farm would cause a more detrimental warming of the globe than burning carbon fuel.
Of course as noted it has to be subsidized by tax credits and money from the real utilities to be able to accomplish this “warming”.
When carbon fuel is burned it gives off CO2 and water vapor as combustion products. Water vapor does cool the air when it changes state from water (liquid) to vapor. A chemical process of restoration happens when carbon fuel is burned. The CO2 products of combustion feeds the plants. And the water vapor is returned to the atmosphere where it originally came from just as the CO2 came from plant life millions of years old that was turned to oil or coal. It’s stored energy was released back to where it came from.
Burning carbon based fuel adds chemicals back into the global system from where they came. Wind turbines simply put sensible heat into the air. It is dumb heat up to no good.
You like most dumbed down Americans have not learned any thing at all about the CO2 life cycle for plants and animals. Or what heat is and how it is made or not made. So much for PC “science”, union teachers, and PC indoctrination and the affirmative action buffoon that is now the POTUS, along with Algore the Fat.
Don’t let my criticism of you stop you from asking questions. I know you have to protect your fragile self image. Bit down hard on a stick. However you did bring up a very good point that I wanted to answer with additional points.
Isn’t what they taught you in school– Win lose or draw you are a winner! You may be ignorant– maybe, but a winner and the good teachers have maintained your self image. However inaccurate it may be. However much it hurts you in the long run.
I will let you criticize my spelling and not feel a thing. At my age I forgot what I learned when spelling. It comes from using a computer and spell check. Sometimes spell check even puts words into my “mouth.” that were not intended.
Since we are all in the same boat, a boat that is starting to crack up you can’t afford to stay made very long.
Jun 27, 2009 - 8:51 am 114. Marc Malone:#112 Jack Marcotte – I will continue to laugh, thank you, despite your scolding. See, I understand that mockery is a very powerful weapon against thin-skinned tyrants. It also offers plausible feniability. What? Who? Me? Not mee-ee!
Often mockery drives home the point better than any other message.
Btw, thanks for the explanation of the heat exchange in post #113. I will find it useful for future arguments.
Jun 27, 2009 - 5:29 pm